


Love's Labors Lost

by lesbians_and_puns



Category: Captain Marvel (2019)
Genre: Angst, Don't say I didn't warn you, F/F, I mean maybe like a vaguely happy maybe-things-might change ending but it's mostly just fucking sad, also i recognize the shakespeare play this is named after is a comedy but the title just fit okay, no happy endings here!!, this is angsty you guys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-03
Updated: 2019-05-03
Packaged: 2020-02-16 08:35:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18687916
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lesbians_and_puns/pseuds/lesbians_and_puns
Summary: After Carol finds a home planet for the Skrull, she returns to Louisiana to try to get her old life back, but when she finds an old photograph of herself and Maria on Maria's bedside table, they both realize how much they're still missing.





	Love's Labors Lost

Maria leans against the doorframe between the kitchen and their living room, watching Carol patiently quiz Monica on her multiplication tables. It’s domestic and sweet, and Maria tries hard not to imagine what the past six years would have been like if Carol had been around. Carol had finally found the Skrull a home planet, and when she came back and landed in Maria’s yard, she told Maria that she was planning to stay until she was needed somewhere else because she wanted her old life back. Watching the way she interacts with their child – her child? their child – Maria takes a deep breath and steels herself for a conversation about how _much_ of their old life Carol wanted back. She waits until Carol and Monica are cheering and high-fiving, having finally gotten through the eights times table, before she clears her throat and speaks.

“We need to talk, Danvers.”

She intended for it to come out firm, and it does, for a minute – but then Carol’s eyes meet hers and by the time Maria gets to “Danvers” there’s an undercurrent of softness and of resignation.

Carol nods at her slowly, eyes flickering between her face and her posture, clearly trying to read her body language, figure out what this conversation is going to be about. She turns back to Monica, putting on a smile that only looks a little fake, strained ever so slightly at the edges. “Okay, Lieutenant Trouble,” she says easily. “Think you can handle the rest of this yourself?” She waits for Monica’s nod before she puts her hands on her knees, takes a deep breath, and pushes herself up to a standing position. She looks at Maria hesitantly, gesturing loosely around them. “Where do you want…?”

Maria doesn’t wait for her to finish her question, just pushes past her and starts heading up the stairs. She hears Carol following her and her mind flashes back to a high school English class, reading about Orpheus and Eurydice, not understanding why it was so hard for Orpheus to just… not look behind him. She supposes she understands, now. She manages to keep her eyes trained on the top of the stairs, but she fights the urge every step she takes to make sure Carol was following her, that she wouldn’t disappear again. After six years, having her best friend, her partner, her _lover_ , back in her home, walking through it like a stranger, feels so unreal she’s worried she’ll blink and wake up back in reality.

She reaches the top of the stairs and opens the door to her bedroom, pausing just long enough for Carol to slip in behind her. She closes the door and takes a deep breath before turning around to face Carol. There are words on the tip of her tongue, but they falter as she sees Carol looking around intently. Watching her take in the room with unfamiliar eyes is so painful and sickening that Maria is momentarily speechless. Carol is carefully studying the curtains, the armchair by the window that shows its years of use, the soft yellow color of the walls. Her gaze turns toward the bed and Maria remembers what’s on her bedside table at the same moment Carol notices it.

“Is this… us?” Carol asks, picking up the picture frame, eyes fixed on the scene inside. Maria swallows hard, heartbeat quickening, and moves to where Carol is standing. 

“Yeah, it is,” she says, trying to gauge whether to elaborate, what Carol might be thinking. 

The pad of Carol’s thumb slides down the edge of the photo, and Maria realizes that as bad as this is for her, she can’t imagine staring at a photo of yourself and having no recollection of the people or places or memories in it. She moves closer to Carol, looking at the photo with her. 

The picture is faded slightly, but the scene is still clear. They’d driven for way too long to get from their base to this state fair, leaving at some unholy hour to be there early enough for the trip to be worth it. It had been Carol’s idea, but Maria was the one dragging her out of bed that morning, trying not to laugh at how grumpy she was. She’d perked up in the car ride, though; they’d played music loud over the car stereo, and singing along off-key could cheer up Carol like nothing else. They’d spent too much money on carnival food and dumb rides, and Carol had ended up with a sunburn despite Maria’s best efforts to reapply sunscreen. The picture had been taken just after Carol won Maria a massive teddy bear at one of those strength testing games with the hammer and light-up display. Maria had made some offhand remark about the bear being cute, and Carol’s eyes had lit up and she was fishing a ticket out of her pocket before Maria even realized what was happening. When it hit the highest level, Carol smirked at Maria, and winked at her as the game’s manager stood on a stepladder to reach one of the bears. They’d asked two women walking by to take their picture with the disposable camera they’d bought just for the trip, and when one of the women glanced at the other and asked if this was fine, babe, they weren’t in any hurry, both Carol and Maria felt that instant sweep of relief that comes from seeing another gay couple. In the photo, neither of them is looking at the camera. Carol is laughing with her head thrown back, her arms wrapped around Maria’s waist, and Maria is holding the teddy bear and staring at Carol, a reverent smile on her face, clearly delighting in Carol's laughter, clearly in love. That they were a couple would have been obvious to anyone there—part of the reason they had driven so far away from the base—and it’s obvious to anyone looking at the photo, too.

Maria feels tears well up in her eyes, and steps backward, trying to collect herself before Carol asks the obvious question. This wasn’t how she planned to test whether Carol remembered, not how she planned to have her find out if she didn’t. She only has to wait a minute before Carol is turning toward her, holding up the picture.

“We were together,” Carol said. It’s as much a statement as a question, but Maria answers it anyway, meeting her eyes and nodding. 

There’s a minute or two of silence, of Carol looking at the floor, around the room, anywhere but at Maria, before Maria makes her own half-statement, half-question. “You don’t remember.”

Carol looks up at her, worrying at her lip the way she always did when she was nervous, and Maria feels something twist in her gut even before Carol slowly shakes her head.

“I’m sorry,” Carol offers softly, but she winces as she hears how flat those words seem in a room that suddenly feels far emptier than it did before. She glances back and forth between Maria and the photo, eyes full of pain. “I wish I did, but I…”

“It’s fine,” Maria interrupts, needing to gain some kind of control over this conversation, wishing she could just disappear into the floor and never be seen again. 

“It doesn’t seem fine,” Carol says carefully, and Maria feels a stab of anger that she somehow remembers how to read Maria’s body language this well but doesn’t remember years of being together. 

“It _is_ ,” she says, and it comes out harsher than she intends it to, but there’s something vindictively satisfying about the way it makes Carol flinch. “You were dead for six years, Danvers. At least, that’s what we thought. Six years is a _long time_. I learned how to live without you in my life. I moved on.”

Carol doesn’t say anything to contradict her, but her eyes glance toward the bedside table, the one that, for all six years, featured a photo of the two of them in love. Maria feels something uncontainable building inside her and, in a flash of anger and devastation and pain, grabs the picture from Carol’s hands, forces the window open, and hurls it into the muggy Louisiana night. It’s absolutely silent except for the sound of glass breaking as the picture makes impact, and the two stare at each other until Carol breaks the silence.

“I, uh. I think it’s probably best if I leave.” 

“Yeah,” Maria agrees, her voice sounding tinny and unnatural even to her. “Have to get back to saving planets and all that.” 

“Well, _someone’s_ gotta do it,” Carol jokes, but Maria doesn’t laugh and Carol clears her throat and looks at her feet. “I… I am sorry, Maria. I _want_ to remember, I just – ” 

“You just don’t,” Maria finishes for her. “Yeah, I think we probably covered that.”

“… Yeah,” Carol says quietly. “Okay. I… I’ll go say goodbye to the kid, and then I’ll be out of here.”

Maria nods, not trusting herself to say anything else. Carol looks at her, opens her mouth to speak, but she thinks better of it and just swallows hard, walking past Maria through the door. Maria waits until she’s safely out of hearing distance before she turns back to the windowsill, bracing her hands against it, letting herself cry for the first time since Carol came back from helping the Skrull. 

She’s still there when Carol walks out their front door and starts moving through the grass, looking around, clearly trying to find the best place to take off. Maria closes her eyes and waits until her eyelids go orange as a blindingly bright light flashes outside, and she keeps them closed as tears slide down her cheeks. She finally opens them and stares into the black night outside. “Dammit, Danvers,” she chokes out, slamming her fist against the window frame, bracing her head against her fist as tears start to fall again. “I think I liked it better when you were dead.” 

There’s a sharp inhalation behind her, and Maria whirls around to tell Monica to go back to bed but finds Carol standing in the doorway of her bedroom instead. Her mouth is parted, and there are tears falling from her eyes that mirror the ones slipping down Maria’s face. Maria feels herself stop breathing and it seems like the world goes still until Carol speaks.

“I… ” Carol starts, and then she’s reaching out toward Maria, and Maria is jumping back until she realizes something’s in Carol’s hand and she’s trying to give it to her. Maria takes it and squints down at it, and even through her blurry vision she can see it’s a picture frame. She flips it over and there’s the photo of her and Carol, madly in love on a beautiful, sunny Californian day, and it feels like a slap in the face even as there’s a pang of relief in her heart.

“I melted the glass back together,” Carol explains, her voice flat. “Took out the photo first, obviously, but I put it back in. I thought you might still want it. Seems like maybe I was wrong.”

She’s turning on her heel and moving quickly down the stairs before Maria even registers everything that just happened, and panic seizes her as she runs downstairs. She reaches the bottom just in time to see Carol striding out of the house, shoving the door open with enough force that its hinges squeak in protest. Maria curses under her breath as she doubles down into a sprint. She bursts out of the house and yells, “Carol, _wait,_ ” and she knows Carol hears her because her shoulders tighten, but there’s already energy sparking around her and she doesn’t even turn back, just launches herself into the sky. Maria swears and falls to her knees, looking up at the sky, where Carol's already a speck in the distance. The stars blink at Maria back uncaringly, and she feels herself start shaking as a wave of emotion crashes down on her. She has her head in her hands, and the grief is too much, and the cicadas are too loud, and the heat is too oppressive, and without even realizing she's pulling off her shirt and pressing it against her mouth, muffling the sound as she screams into an empty night.

* * *

The next morning is one of the worst of Maria’s life, rivaled only by the morning she and Carol raced to the base and when Carol won – by _cheating_ , dammit, she was _always_ like that – Maria ended up losing both the race and her lover, her best friend, her partner, _Carol_. She groans as she wakes up, rubbing at her headache, stumbling blearily into the bathroom and chugging a glass of water. She glances toward the clock and panic shoots through her veins like ice water. 

“MONICA!” she yells, running back into her room just long enough to pull on a pair of shorts before she’s banging on Monica’s door. “Monica, wake up, we’re late for school, baby!”

There’s no response, and dread forms in the pit of Maria’s stomach. She knows it’s just paranoia fueled by everything with Carol last night, but she has visions of Monica’s lifeless body as she opens her door, only to be greeted by… a perfectly made bed, absolutely devoid of her daughter. The panic is replaced by confusion with a slight hint of suspicion, but she walks downstairs, calling for Monica softly. When she arrives in the kitchen, there’s a note on the table.

_Mama, Auntie Carol said that you were feeling sick and to be extra good for a few days. Don’t worry, I’m at school. She made me promise to get myself up and make sure I make the bus. It’s only 7:30 right now, so I’ll be at the stop on time, no problem._

It’s signed with a scrawl as untidy as Carol’s used to be, which makes Maria laugh despite herself. She makes herself a big pot of coffee, but even that is painful. The last time Carol was here, she was only around for a couple hours at a time. This visit, she’d stayed for a few days, just long enough for Maria to get used to her presence and remember all of the mundane details of their life together: how Maria always made the coffee in the morning but Carol insisted on being the one to rinse out the mugs; how Carol refused to eat exactly the same thing for breakfast two days in a row – “I got enough of that in boot camp, thank you” – but was too out of it in the morning to actually cook, so Maria kept at least two kinds of jam in the fridge so Carol could alternate what she put on her toast; how they would play soft music after they sent Monica upstairs to bed every night and Carol would kiss her as she dried the dishes and how Carol always managed to get her pressed up against the counter as she – 

Maria shook her head vigorously. “That’s enough,” she tells herself firmly. By the time Monica comes home, she’s become at least somewhat human again, thanks to two cold showers and channeling all of her anger into hammering out panels for her next project in the garage.

“How was your day, baby?” Maria asks, but Monica brushes off the question with a quick “fine!” before dashing up to her room. Maria put her hands on her hips, ready to remind Monica that that is not the manners they act with in this house, but Monica is running back down the stairs just as quickly and thrusts two things into her mom’s hands.

“What… What is this?” Maria asks, turning the gadgets over in her hands.

“Auntie Carol gave them to me,” Monica says, grabbing it from her mom and spinning it around, showing her how it worked. “She said they’re ‘fancy pagers.’ I can press this button any time I’m thinking about her, and it’ll tell her! And she said she’ll do it back when she can.” She presses a button and waits, holding her breath, until there’s a soft chirping sound and the screen lights up with Carol’s response a few seconds later: the same star that was on her uniform.

Maria has to resist the urge to roll her eyes, but it’s touching enough that she also feels a stab of pain in her chest. “Is it always the star?” she asks, and Monica nods. 

“She set it, it doesn’t change,” Monica explains. “Yours is probably the same, but I don’t know. She made me cross-my-heart-hope-to-die that I wouldn’t use yours.” Monica’s face, which had been beaming, darkens slightly into a pout as she adds, “ _Yours_ lets you actually _talk_ to her. Or record messages. Or something. She said if I wanted to use it I should just ask you, which is mean, because I _am_ responsible and - ”

“So… If I press this button, that means I’m thinking of her?” Maria interrupts slowly, and Monica nods eagerly. Maria bit her lip, staring at the pager, but then Monica is running outside yelling something about playing with the neighbors’ kids, and between chasing her down to make sure she did her homework, then helping her with said homework, then making dinner and relenting to Monica’s begging to bake cookies together, she doesn't have time to sit down until late that night. She sits on the edge of her bed, picking up the pager, setting it down, over and over until she finally, heartbeat hammering, presses the button and waits. And waits. And tries not to think about how quickly Carol responded to Monica.

An hour later, she finally puts the pager on the bedside table, trying not to cry. After the way things ended between them yesterday, she can’t say she’s… _surprised_ , but she hates herself for how quickly she fell back in love with Carol Danvers that she’s this hurt by the lack of a response. She feels particularly pathetic since she knows Carol doesn’t reciprocate her feelings; that, if nothing else, was very clear after last night. But it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, and her bed feels empty in a way it hasn't felt in six years.

And if, three days later, when she finally gets a response – a beep, a screen lit up with a heart that only makes her cry a little bit, and a brief audio message of a very out-of-breath Carol apologizing for the delay – she falls asleep clutching the pager, then, well. She’ll deal with the repercussions of being this careless with her heart later.

**Author's Note:**

> scream at me in the comics or on tumblr (@lesbiansandpuns), I promise I'm just as unhappy about this as you are


End file.
